PrestaShop v1.5 is Now Available For Download

1.) Introducing PrestaShop v1.5

When PrestaShop opened its doors in 2007, we employed five people and powered approximately 200 active online stores. Nearly one year later, PrestaShop released v1.0, a revolutionary open-source e-commerce solution specifically designed to make the world of online sales accessible to everyone.

Since our inception, PrestaShop has experienced tremendous growth. Today we employ more than 100 e-commerce addicts and power approximately 125,000 active online stores in 43 countries.

Through the years, our commitment to deliver the fastest, most efficient and user friendly e-commerce experience has never wavered. We’ve nurtured our company and watched it grow. We’ve made amazing advancements in technology, formed partnerships with global industry leaders and hosted e-commerce events all throughout the world.

Those already using PrestaShop will be thrilled to discover just how simple it is to upgrade your current store. PrestaShop’s core developers have spent countless hours designing a “1-click upgrade” module that, when installed through your Back Office, will allow every PrestaShop merchant to upgrade to v1.5 with effective ease and efficiency.

While the entire PrestaShop team stands behind the one-click upgrade method, it is strongly advised that you download, install and sample v1.5 locally before updating your live store. This way, you can take v1.5 out for a virtual test drive before deciding if its right for you and your business.

If PrestaShop is new to you, the release of v1.5 means there has never been a better time to download our free, open-source software. If you want to sample the new version of PrestaShop for yourself, simply click here and you’ll automatically be redirected to our download page.

Installation and customization are a breeze, and we invite you to watch this short configuration video to see how simple it is for everyone to start their own online business with PrestaShop v1.5.

No matter who you are or what you do for a living, owning and operating an online store has never been easier. With more than 300+ out-of-the-box features included in PrestaShop v1.5, anyone can create a truly unique and successful online business.

The list of new features housed in v1.5 is far too long to mention in its entirety here, but we’re happy to highlight some of the key ones for you, below.

2.) New Features

Multistore management

With options for multiple currencies, multiple languages and multiple domains, multistore management is complete, efficient and integrated into PrestaShop v1.5. This new feature will allow any merchant, regardless of business size, to manage multiple stores from a single Back Office.

Cart-pricing rules

PrestaShop v1.5 allows you to manage your cart’s pricing rules easily through an ergonomic interface. Additionally, merchants can now provide discounts on any and all items in a customers’ cart. This feature provides an overtly-efficient way to market promotional offers upon checkout.

New modules API

For new APIs, the structure has been revised to help you simply and efficiently manage updates to all of your modules. The APIs will now automatically check to ensure you always have the latest version(s) of each module installed into your Back Office.

Rewritten Core

PrestaShop’s core software has been rewritten to meet the MVC pattern and the object paradigm. This will make it even easier for all developers using PrestaShop.

Redesigned Back Office

With an improved ergonomic Back Office and an updated graphical layout, PrestaShop’s new Back Office design is visually stunning and very easy to use. The redesign respects the MVC pattern to allow developers to quickly make customizations, if needed.

(Check out the new Back Office design)

Editing commands in Back Office

The editing commands in the Back Office have been optimized and relaxed. You will now be able to modify customers’ shopping carts as well as products already ordered. You will also be able to place orders from the back office, allowing you to help customers make purchases on your site (i.e. when they contact you by phone).

Improved Front Office Design and Functionality

The customer experience has been improved, including the order and checkout processes. Merchants will now also be able to offer comprehensive product descriptions on a homepage that has been reimagined, and rebuilt from the ground up.

(New default template)

Improved After-Sales Service

The integrated customer service feature has been greatly improved to centralize all of your customers’ messages from multiple sources. This new feature allows you to sync all of your email accounts so you can view and send messages directly from your Back Office.

For greater efficiency, PrestaShop will now include an inventory management tool allowing you to discern your physical stock from available quantities. In v1.5, you will now be able to manage your inventory in various warehouses, generate supply orders and view your stock through clear and specific interfaces. This inventory management tool is natively compatible with the new multistore feature, so managing your entire catalog of products has never been easier. Finally, for flexibility in managing customer orders, partial deliveries will now be available.

Improved management of downloadable products

We have made selling downloadable products (photos, music, computer files, etc…) easier. You will now be able to manage product variations and create packages of multiple downloadable products. The file upload process has also improved.

In addition to the features provided above, multiple delivery addresses are now available. This way, if a customer chooses to shop for Christmas, or some other big event, they can buy multiple products at once and ship them individually to family and friends all over the world.

Several new partner modules have also been added as native features inside PrestaShop v1.5′s source code.

PrestaShop’s partner modules function better in v1.5 then they have in previous versions of our software. Utilizing modules allows you to completely customize the look, feel and functionality of your online business.

3.) Improved Performance

Since making the first release candidate version of 1.5 public, PrestaShop’s developers have made 626 improvements to our software. Check out the graph below for a visual representation of the number of issues reported versus the number of fixes made.

As you can see, 379 issues were reported and our developers resolved 626 issues. So what does this mean for you, the merchant? Quite simply, it means the troublesome glitches that once existed in previous versions of PrestaShop no longer exist.

PrestaShop developers have also spent a great deal of time improving merchant SEO. For example, your store’s URLs will now be produced by configurable URL rewriting, thus allowing for maximum optimization across search engines.

4.) Upgrade your store

Now that we’ve told you a little about PrestaShop v1.5, let us show you how to utilize the one-click upgrade method. The information provided below will walk you through the entire process. If you have any questions or upgrade concerns, feel free to email PrestaShop’s customer support department.

(While we fully support the efficiency of the 1-click upgrade module, please back up both your database and files before starting the upgrade process. If you are not sure how to back up your store, please refer to your hosting provider)

Navigate to the Modules tab and then click “Add a module from my computer”

Click “Browse” under “Module file” and select the 1-click Upgrade module you just downloaded

If the module was installed successfully, you will see a green box appear at the top of your Back Office

You will now need to deactivate your store by visiting the Preferences tab and selecting “No” for Enable Shop

Navigate to the modules tab and search “1-click Upgrade”

After locating the module, you will need to install it.

Now you’ll want to make sure the module is configured properly. You can do this by clicking “Configure” after installation

If you do not see the Latest Official version listed as 1.5.0 final, you will likely need to click the “More Options Icon” under the section 2 – Upgrade.

Once in advanced mode, simply select “Major releases” in the Channel section then click save.

You can now minimize the advanced options window if you would like. Then, you will need scroll through the options toward the bottom of the page and make sure your store meets all the required checks. When you are finished customizing your options and all the checks have been met, make sure to click SAVE at the bottom of the page before starting the upgrade. This is crucial.

Only after saving your options, click “Upgrade PrestaShop now.” Doing so will automatically download the latest version of PrestaShop (v1.5) and start the upgrade process.

The upgrade may take some time, so be patient. All details about the upgrade will be listed in the activity log see below.

5.) Special thanks to our Community

While we are eternally grateful to PrestaShop’s core developers for making v1.5 the best version of PrestaShop to date, we would like to extend a special thank you to our Community for their continued support and feedback. In particular, we would like to thank the following users who have been deemed PrestaShop’s Top 100 Contributors on the Forge.

Their contributions helped power our developers through endless hours of coding in order to deliver this incredible new version of PrestaShop, v1.5.

Also, a huge thank you is owed to Oleacorner– a.k.a Olivier Bonningues — for all of his efforts in helping us optimize the cart page by making it faster for every PrestaShop user.

6.) Conclusion

The world of e-commerce is a vast and untapped economic resource. Recent figures provided by Forester Research suggests a 15% industry growth increase in the next four years. Additionally, research indicates average consumer spending will escalate by 44%.

125,000+ merchants around the world use PrestaShop to power their online businesses. And with PrestaShop v1.5 now available for global use, there has never been a better time to open your own e-commerce website.

All it takes to be successful in the growing world e-commerce is a great idea, a little hard work, focus and an unwavering commitment to succeed. In other words, you supply the drive and determination, and PrestaShop will provide the necessary tools needed to help you achieve your entrepreneurial dreams.